1. This architect, educated at UC Berkeley and Paris’s École des Beaux-Arts designed SF City
Hall, Opera House, Coit Tower, and the rotunda at the erstwhile City of Paris department store, site of today’s Nieman Marcus.
a. Bernard Maybeck
b. Andrew Skurman
c. Arthur Brown, Jr.
2. Closed for several years due to damage sustained during the Loma Prieta Earthquake of 1989, City Hall officially reopened on January 5, 1999. Name the presiding mayor at that time.
a. Willie Brown
b. Frank Jordan
c. Art Agnos
3. In 2000, this Hearst SF Examiner columnist wrote: “I wonder whether we today would have
the strength, or sense of community, to go through another depression. I think we would … we’re tougher than we think.”
a. Ken Garcia
b. Rob Morse
c. Charles McCabe
4. In January 2001, a storm stranded more than three hundred on Alcatraz Island. For over six hours, the marooned guests watched the movie The Rock, while former inmate, Leon “Whitey” Thompson autographed copies of his autobiography in the island bookstore. The prison had closed in:
a. 1963
b. 1957
c. 1933
5. At Stacey’s Bookstore on Market Street at the beginning of 2002, nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee and Helen Zia were on hand to sell their book, My Country Versus Me, billed as a story of:
a. treason, reversals, and monkeyshines
b. espionage, betrayal, and shenanigans
c. prejudice, suspicion, and courage
6. UCSF is one of the top medical research institutions in the country, if not the world. In January 2003, its new facility opened at:
a. the site of Candlestick Park football stadium
b. Mission Bay near AT&T Ballpark
c. Land’s End
7. On January 10, 2003, Rusty, the beloved 35-year-old, 308-pound Sumatran orangutan passed away quietly in his sleep at the San Francisco Zoo. Rusty had a habit of:
a. munching on bunches of organic bananas
b. riding the steam-train at night when no
one else was around
c. blowing kisses to his caretakers
8. Said this famous actor, who set the tone for classes at the Mother of Invention Acting School in San Francisco: “I could play ten performances a week forever and thrive on it. I’m never bored. People who get bored don’t know their craft. There’s always something new to be gleaned
from every performance.”
a. Uta Hagen
b. Angelina Jolie
c. Sharon Stone
9. On his own dime, Mayor Newsom flew to world-class ski resort, Davos, in Switzerland, to
attend a World Economic Forum in the winter of 2006. Newsom was scheduled to participate on two panels: “Governing from the Bottom Up” and:
a. “Greening Cites”
b. “Pioneering Cities”
c. “Closing Cities to Through Traffic”
10. Bay Area poet and playwright Gabe Crane’s one-act play, Thoughts for a Lonely Supermarket, is set in a vast Andronico’s supermarket where, he says,
a. “People just want the cheapest cuts of meat.”
b. “People just want to stock up on Dutch cheese.”
c. “People just want to be left alone.”
Answers
1. c
2. a (1996–2004)
3. b
4. a
5. c (In June 2006, Lee received $1.6 million from the federal government and six media organizations as part of a settlement of a civil suit.)
6. b
7. c
8. a
9. b
10. c
Victor Turks grew up in San Francisco and lives in the Richmond with his wife, Michiko, their three boys, a pug, a cat, and a tankful of goldfish. He teaches English at City College.
